Posts Tagged ‘Funding’

Loughborough University hosts the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Embedded Intelligence since April 2013. This centre is training the engineers and scientists of the future in Embedded Intelligence technologies at post-graduate level before they join industry as high calibre employees.

We are proud to count on more than 50 industrial partners to be part of our Centre, co-sponsoring studentships or providing with industrial and research experience to our PhD candidates. Some of them are large companies such as Ford, Renishaw, GE, MOOG, JLR, Rolls-Royce, Taylor Hobson, AVL, Apical (part of ARM), etc. Some others are SMEs who believe that research in this topic can make the difference to their business. To name a few of our collaborators and supporters: FAR UK, Printed Electronics Ltd, Izon Science Ltd, Effect Tech ltd, Motion Robotics ltd, etc. Other organisations that support training and industry impact are also part of the Centre, e.g. MTC, NPL, MTG research, HSSMI, Moredun, and TWI. The Centre keeps sight of employability and realistic prospects for our students once they graduate, so the ILM is also working with us. Our Centre is about applied science, technology and engineering. It is well known that we might be missing half of the population (i.e. females, who are ~5% of the eng-tech workforce in the country) to fill the technical and engineering posts in the next 5-15 years. The Centre’s Consortium is assisted by WISE (via the Scottish Resource Centre for Women in SET) so we can effectively encourage more women into engineering, trying to achieve gender balance that brings competitive benefits to UK’s plcs.

We are looking for bright students who would like to study and research the integration of ‘intelligence’ into products, machines, buildings, factories, work environments, transport systems, and supply chains.

We have managed to secure funding from the Office for Low Emission Vehicles, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), Innovate UK and Far UK Ltd to develop research that makes an impact on emissions savings from road vehicles.

My Multifunctional Materials Manufacturing Lab at Wolfson School and my industrial collaborator (Far UK ltd) have been awarded more than £250k to develop excellent science that allows the design and manufacture of low weight structures for vehicle chassis components. Low weight is beneficial for reduced tailpipe emissions for both existing internal combustion engine vehicles but also as an enabler for further electrification of the fleet. The manufacture of the optimised structures via the sonication process incurs another challenge: to achieve mass market weight reduction this needs to be done cost effectively.

Lightweight materials are the next pit-stop in the challenge of reducing mass, curbing emissions and improving fuel economy in the low carbon vehicles of tomorrow.

UK’s ambitious commitment to decarbonisation of the transport industry by 2050 is going to require a creative approach. Current reductions have been gained by improvements in engine performance but these gains are diminishing. If we were to go 100% electric, we still need to produce the electricity, so the footprint is not necessarily diminished as much as it could appear. To meet the carbon emissions target we need to reduce vehicle mass. For example, a car the size of a Ford Focus would need to reduce mass by about 300kg (from ~1200kg to ~900kg). The car industry needs to find a way to manufacture lightweights without adding production cost in the shorter term.

Loughborough University and Far UK Ltd, a Nottingham-based innovative low-volume tailored vehicle designer and manufacturer, have joined forces to explore the concept of novel and engineered structures, multifunctional materials bespoke for their mechanical properties, and manufactured in a cost-benefit and continuous fashion using Sonication technology that allows on-demand tailoring of porosity. This exciting research program has just secured co-funding from the UK’s innovation agency, Innovate UK.

This programme of research presents a new avenue for high value manufacturing and helps support the UK knowledge base, economy and jobs.

Loughborough University has been awarded the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Embedded Intelligence. In collaboration with 23 external partners (large companies, SMEs and other organisations that support training and industry impact) and Heriot-Watt as academic partner, this centre will train the engineers and scientists of the future at post-graduate level before they join industry as high calibre employees.

The research activities in this CDT are around the integration of ‘intelligence’ into products, machines, buildings, factories, work environments, transport systems, and supply chains. And nature can inspire the best examples of Embedded Intelligence.

The 4-year programme includes: (i) technical training in key areas of Embedded Intelligence; (ii) non-technical training in the ‘Double Transition’, to equip our students with the skills to be effective researchers during their PhD (from undergraduate into postgrad studies), and to become suitably qualified employees (from students to graduates); and (iii) industry interaction from early days throughout in a myriad of applied research rich-impact activities.

We were part of the bid submitted to EPSRC for Networks on Novel Materials and Novel Use of Materials in the Built Environment. We are delighted that it has been successful in securing funding. Led by the BRE Centre for Innovative Construction Materials at the University of Bath, and with more that 20 partners (academic, industrial and charities), the network activities will commence in September 2011.

LIMES.NET will become the Network for Low Impact Materials and innovative Engineering
Solutions for ground & structural engineering.

Our vision for LIMES.NET is to create a community of multi-disciplinary researchers, practitioners and decision makers with a common goal of establishing a coherent and holistic research agenda to deliver novel, effective and appropriate solutions for a sustainable built environment fit for the global challenges of the 21st Century. LIMES.NET will focus on innovative construction materials and their novel use required to deliver and maintain a sustainable built environment.

Biomimetics will play an important role in this network, so we are delighted to be part of it!

EPSRC has granted us funding (approx £250k) for our “Customisation of Cosmetic Covers for Artificial Limbs” project. The project, submitted under the EPSRC-Healthcare Partnerships call, will start on 1st August 2010. The PI for the project is Prof J. Corney (DMEM, Univ of Strathclyde), Co-I is Dr K. Murray (National Centre for Prosthetics and Orthotics, Glasgow) and Researcher Co-I Dr. Carmen Torres-Sánchez. There will be a fourth member of the team (TBA). The industrial partners for the projects are PACE Rehabilitation and Blatchford Ltd.